Nobody spoke for several seconds.
The recording remained paused on the phone.
Michael Vance.
The name seemed to hang over the room.
Brandon sat down.
“My father trusted him.”
Detective Harris nodded.
“He was his financial adviser.”
“And then he disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“We don't know.”
I looked at the photograph again.
Richard Sterling.
Barbara.
Michael Vance.
Three people standing together.
One dead.
One controlling the family.
One supposedly gone.
But Michael's voice had been recorded less than two days earlier.
Which meant someone had lied.
The detective asked me to describe everything Barbara had done.
I told her about the wedding dress.
The hidden cords.
The luggage pieces.
The messages.
The investigator.
The stolen folder.
I told her about the photograph of my old apartment.
She listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she said, “This is bigger than a family dispute.”
Brandon looked at her.
“What does that mean?”
“It means somebody has been constructing a case against Emily.”
“For what?”
“Fraud. Theft. Potentially financial misconduct.”
I stared at her.
“But I didn't do anything.”
“I know.”
She held up a hand.
“I am not accusing you. I'm telling you what someone may be trying to make investigators believe.”
Brandon stood.
“Can they do that?”
“If the evidence is fabricated carefully enough, yes.”
I looked at the empty compartment in my suitcase.
“They took the folder because it proves the opposite.”
“Probably.”
“Then we need to find it.”
“Yes.”
The detective looked at Brandon.
“And you need to decide whether you want to help your mother.”
His expression hardened.
“No.”
“I am asking because once we open this investigation, your family name will be involved.”
Brandon looked at me.
Then at Lisa.
“My family already involved itself.”
Detective Harris nodded.
“Then we proceed.”
She asked us to remain available.
Before leaving, she stopped beside me.
“Emily.”
“Yes?”
“Did Barbara ever threaten you directly?”
I thought about the cathedral.
Her quiet words.
You have no idea what I found.
“No.”
“Not once?”
“No.”
The detective nodded.
“That may matter.”
After she left, the room became quiet again.
Lisa was asleep.
Megan had taken her to the bedroom.
Brandon stood beside the window.
I joined him.
“What are you thinking?”
“That I don't know my family.”
I said nothing.
He continued.
“My father was always careful with money. He taught me to keep records. He hated debt. He hated secrets.”
He looked at me.
“Why would he have been investigating his own company?”
“Maybe he discovered something.”
“And Barbara knew.”
“Maybe.”
He shook his head.
“I need proof.”
“You will get it.”
He looked at me.
“How?”
I reached into my handbag.
There was one thing I had not told him.
A small key.
He stared.
“What is that?”
“It was in the blue folder.”
“Before it was stolen?”
“Yes.”
I placed it in his hand.
“I didn't understand what it opened.”
He examined it.
A number was engraved into the metal.
417.
He looked at me.
“Your father's office?”
“I don't know.”
“Where did you get it?”
“From my ex-husband.”
His eyes narrowed.
“When?”
“Three years before he died.”
“What did he say?”
“He told me never to give it to anyone.”
Brandon looked toward the door.
“Why?”
“He said if anyone from the Sterling family ever came asking for it, I should pretend I didn't have it.”
Brandon stared at the key.
“Emily, why didn't you tell me this before?”
“Because I didn't know whether it was important.”
“And now?”
“Now I think it is.”
Megan returned.
“Lisa is asleep.”
She saw the key.
“What is that?”
Brandon answered.
“Something my father may have hidden.”
Megan looked at me.
“Then we need to find where it belongs.”
The next morning, Detective Harris called.
She had found something.
Michael Vance had been seen in the city two weeks earlier.
There was security footage.
A hotel.
A parking garage.
A bank.
All under different names.
But the same man.
Detective Harris sent us an address.
An abandoned office building.
Fourth floor.
Room 417.
I looked at Brandon.
The key was in his hand.
We went with the detective.
The building smelled of dust and old carpet.
The elevator groaned as it climbed.
When the doors opened, the corridor was empty.
Room 417 stood at the end.
Brandon inserted the key.
It turned.
The door opened.
Inside was a small office.
No furniture.
No computer.
No papers.
Nothing.
Except a metal filing cabinet.
Detective Harris checked it.
Locked.
Brandon tried the key.
It opened.
Inside were folders.
Dozens.
Each labeled with a date.
One had his father's name.
Another had Barbara's.
A third had my name.
I stared.
“How long has he been watching me?”
Detective Harris opened it.
Inside were photographs.
My apartment.
My school.
Lisa's school.
My parents' house.
Brandon's face tightened.
“This is surveillance.”
“Yes,” the detective said.
“Who ordered it?”
She turned the page.
A payment authorization was attached.
The signature was Barbara's.
Brandon stepped back.
His mother had not simply investigated me.
She had monitored me.
For years.
Then Detective Harris opened another file.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
She handed it to Brandon.
Inside was a copy of a document dated eight years earlier.
It was signed by Richard Sterling.
A handwritten note appeared across the bottom.
If anything happens to me, do not trust Barbara.
Brandon's face went white.
He read it again.
Then again.
I touched his arm.
He didn't move.
The detective turned another page.
There was a second note.
This one was addressed to Brandon.
My son,
If you ever find this, understand that I was trying to protect what belongs to you.
The rest of the page had been torn away.
Brandon looked at the empty space.
“Who tore it?”
Detective Harris examined the edge.
“Recently.”
A sound came from the hallway.
Footsteps.
We all turned.
The door slammed shut.
Someone had locked us inside.
Brandon rushed toward it.
He pulled the handle.
Nothing.
Detective Harris drew her weapon.
“Stay back.”
The smell of smoke reached us.
Megan shouted from behind the filing cabinet.
“There's smoke coming under the door!”
I grabbed Lisa.
She was with us.
I had forgotten for one terrible second that she had followed us into the room.
Brandon pulled her close.
Detective Harris kicked at the door.
The smoke thickened.
Then a voice came through the hallway.
Michael Vance.
“You should have left the past alone.”
Brandon shouted, “What do you want?”
A pause.
Then Michael answered.
“The folder.”
Brandon looked at me.
I understood.
He still believed we had it.
But the blue folder was gone.
Unless—
I remembered something.
Before leaving the hotel, I had checked the lining of my handbag.
There was a second compartment.
I reached inside.
My fingers touched paper.
I pulled it out.
A small folded document.
Not the blue folder.
One page.
The final page from the folder.
The page I had removed the night before the wedding because I could not understand it.
At the bottom was a signature.
Richard Sterling.
And beneath it, one sentence.
Barbara must never know the account exists.
The smoke grew thicker.
Michael spoke again from the hallway.
“Give me the page.”
I held it tightly.
Brandon looked at me.
“Don't.”
I nodded.
Detective Harris fired once into the lock.
The door opened.
Fresh air rushed in.
We ran.
Outside, the detective looked at the document.
She read it.
Then she looked at Brandon.
“This account could change everything.”
“What account?”
She pointed to a number.
“A private trust.”
“Whose?”
She looked at me.
“Yours.”
I stared at the page.
“My name?”
“Yes.”
“But I never knew about it.”
Detective Harris folded the document.
“Then Barbara has been hiding something from you.”
Brandon looked toward the burning building.
Michael Vance was gone.
But now we knew the truth had been hidden somewhere much closer than we imagined.
And for the first time, the blue folder was no longer the most important evidence.
The real secret was the account Richard Sterling had created in my name.
Click here to continue reading: PART 9: The Trust in My Name Had Been Created Before I Met Brandon, and Its First Payment Explained Why Barbara Had Been Watching Me
I Thought I Was Marrying Into a Family, Until One Strange Package Arrived and Made Me Question What They Were Really Planning
Part 8 of 15
